Since lawmakers cleared the way last year for a Major League Baseball stadium and related development on Salt Lake City’s west side, residents and city leaders have feared it would force Utah’s capital to jack up property taxes.
To guide development, legislators created the Utah Fairpark Area Investment and Restoration District, a taxing entity with the authority to collect 75% of the revenue generated by new growth along North Temple, near Redwood Road.
Because Salt Lake City would still be on the hook for providing resources like sewer, water and emergency responses to the associated Power District development, officials in City Hall worry the diversion of revenue will hamstring their ability to keep up with demand for services.
(The Larry H. Miller Co.) A rendering shows what could come of the west side's Power District development along North Temple.
Another massive nearby project shows those concerns may have merit. The Utah Inland Port Authority, another state-created taxing entity, is already costing Salt Lake City property owners.
For the second time in four years, the Salt Lake City Mosquito Abatement District is raising property taxes due, in part, to the port creating additional mosquito service needs and capturing 75% of revenue from new development in the western reaches of the city.
Port redirecting tax revenue
In 2022, the mosquito district, the local government agency tasked with controlling the bugs in Utah’s capital, hiked its property tax rate by 75%. Last month, the district’s Board of Trustees, who are appointed by the Salt Lake City Council, voted 3-0 to raise the rate again this year, this time by 19.5%. Two trustees — state Senate Minority Leader Luz Escamilla and University of Utah biology professor Neil Vickers — were absent from the meeting.
“We’re being just nickeled and dimed to death and this is just one more thing,” Rose Park Community Council Chair Kevin Parke said at the Dec. 19 meeting. “And while I think your goals are admirable, I look at areas that have been carved out that are no longer technically under Salt Lake City’s control, the inland port and the [Power District] … I’m wondering if there’s not a way to obtain funding from these other entities.”
The port began collecting revenue from new growth within its boundaries in 2021.
Before the establishment of the port, 100% of property taxes from the northwest quadrant of Utah’s capital were split between the city, Salt Lake County, and other special service districts like the mosquito district. Now, those entities only get the base revenue they received in 2020 — before the port takeover — and 25% of new growth.
Utah property tax law prohibits government agencies from collecting more revenue than they did the previous year. The only ways to get more money are to collect property taxes from new development or to raise the property tax rate altogether.
“And since most of the new growth in our district is in the west side … obviously this impacts us,” mosquito district executive director Ary Faraji said in an email.
That’s because three-quarters of that revenue from new growth goes straight to the port.
What will the new mosquito taxes pay for?
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) The Salt Lake City Mosquito Abatement District building is pictured on Thursday, Dec. 19, 2024.
When the mosquito district last considered raising property taxes in 2021, Faraji and others gave four main reasons: keep up with immediate post-pandemic inflation, hire for three new major positions, build up a drone program and buy a new bug-killing helicopter, and research new mosquito-fighting techniques.
That tax rate hike required the average homeowner to pay an additional $16.72 a year and an owner of a million-dollar business to pay an extra $85. In total, it brought in a little less than $3 million more in 2022.
That extra money helped fill those open positions, fund new research and pay for worker raises. While the district has significantly increased its use of drones to target and spray mosquitos since the 2021 tax hike, it hasn’t purchased a helicopter yet.
After last month’s increase, the average Salt Lake City homeowner will pay about $10 more a year, bringing the annual payment to the district to about $60. An owner of a million-dollar business will have to cough up an additional $29 a year, bringing the total annual payment to $176.
“We have to continue being proactive,” Shireen Mooers, the board’s chair, said at the meeting. “I’m sorry that it is a tax increase at this very difficult time. … We looked at every way we could possibly do our operations without and it really wasn’t an option to forgo it this year.”
The reasons for the rate bump approved last month are similar to the 2021 hike: The mosquito district says it needs to keep up with inflation, and that it wants to finally get that helicopter hovering over the Great Salt Lake’s wetlands.
Faraji, the executive director, said the budget has needed increases in order to provide more service because climate change has resulted in a longer mosquito season and the growing port requires more mitigation efforts to protect its workforce.
Group calls for reimbursement
(Rick Egan | The Salt Lake Tribune) The Salt Lake City Intermodal Terminal, part of the inland port, in 2023.
Port Executive Director Ben Hart concedes the authority is part of the reason the mosquito district needs to raise taxes, but insists his organization is necessary to boost Utah’s economy.
“We’re here to make a difference for projects that will increase property taxes [from businesses] for generations to come,” Hart said. “And yes, that does take some sacrifice and we understand that’s a part of what the inland port model is, but we also understand that with that comes great responsibility to use this money in the right way.”
The mosquito district has also completed more work at the site of the new Utah State Prison since its 2022 opening, but the prison reimburses the bug service to the tune of $300,000 a year.
Without naming any specific entity, mosquito board trustee Amanda Barth lamented “the lopsided burden of some development” that isn’t kicking in cash for bug control, saying “it’s just frustrating” and “it’s not fair.”
The Westside Coalition advocacy group penned a letter to mosquito district officials before the vote lodging concerns with the tax increase — especially around the timing and the repetitive reasons for the hike — asking the entity to diversify its revenues with sources like grants and develop a reimbursement agreement with the port.
Such a negotiation is underway between Salt Lake City and the Utah Fairpark Area Investment and Restoration District. Last month, the city and taxing authority struck a one-year deal to extend the district’s ability to collect 75% of revenue from new growth while a longer-term money-sharing agreement could be reached.
One other new Salt Lake City tax will go into effect in the new year: a half-a-percentage-point sales tax increase to fund improvements to Delta Center and the planned downtown entertainment and sports district.
